Ancient Eternal Star Region, atop of Blackstone Fortress, the Central Command on the top of Pyramid.
The origins of the Blackstone Fortress were unclear, but it was apparently, found by someone in the Solar Federation in some data vault, dug up in some godforsaken world in the Milky Way Galaxy; nobody knew its origins or who designed it.
It was only known that it was an extremely powerful weapon of war, and something that the Solar Federation could not dream of constructing due to the resources required for it, so they just stored it in the central A.I. STC Command and left it there.
And somehow, countless years later, Zeoticus figured out how to construct it.
While the Solar Federation didn't theoretically lack the resources to construct the fortress, what they lacked was the engine, which required a tremendous amount of energy, comparable to several massive Stars like a Sun, something which wasn't possible with their current level of technology.
The engine was essential in powering up all the fancy weapons and other functions of the Blackstone Fortress.
And then, the Chtnonian Empire, the scientists, and engineers within the Magisterium of Arcanotech and Magisterium of Arcane and Magic Research came up with the proposal of using the Planar Core of Primary Grade 2 Plane as the base material for the engine.
Right now, an enormous swarm of Voidships, numbering in thousands, was approaching the Ancient Eternal Star Region, as they were going to hit the Taesci Territory hit and hard, now when the window of the opportunity has presented itself.
The Hivemind has already retreated to the Divine Star Region after the debacle in the Underworld Garden Plane, and now, the Ancient Eternal Star Region was left drastically weakened, with countless of their powerhouses dead, TIer 12 all injured, and many places without a ruler.
That was the terror of the Void Insect Swarm, and that was only a Tier 12 one, but it was peak Tier 12, and if it borrowed the psionic potential of the entire Swarm, then it could obtain the combat prowess of Tier 13 for a limited amount of time.
"One hour till we arrive at the Ancient Eternal Star Region."
Said the A.I. of the Blackstone Fortress, as Sirzechs was sitting in the logue on the top of the pyramid together with Elders of the Baator, namely Elder Zekram and Asura, and together with them, there were some important people of the Military, ironically mostly the members of the Imperial House or the Electoral Houses.
Sirzechs could see that Vali was already getting impatient with this entire ordeal as the man reached the pinnacle of Tier 10 and now itched for the fight, like the proper battle maniac he was.
"What are the most recent news from the region?"
Questioned Sirzechs because, technically, he was the person in charge of everything here.
"Negative. The state remains the same."
Answered the A.I. of the Blackstone Fortress, as everybody was satisfied with the current development.
The thing was, as nothing changed in the Ancient Eternal Star Region, it meant that Hivemind didn't return or some Tier 12 powerhouse appeared.
After one hour, the Void Fleets of the Chthonian Empire of the Baator finally arrived at the outskirts of the Ancient Eternal Star Region.
The moment they arrived at the vicinity of the Ancient Eternal Star Region, Sirzechs gave an order to increase the combat readiness to maximum, as the engagement with the hostile targets could happen anytime.
Their current location was not far from the Taesci Territory, which was heavily devastated by the Void Inscests of the Swarm and the Hivemind, so right now, the Taesci were salvaging what they could, searching for the survivors as countless of their planes were exterminated or attacked.
***
The Taesci Territory, Grade 1 Plane of the Taesci Species, unknown location, Temple of the Serpent.
In the unknown location of the Grade 1 Plane, which was the birthplace of the Taesci Species, there was a Temple, a Temple decided to the Ancestor of the Taesci Species and the sole Tier 12 powerhouse their race had.
This allowed them to arrogantly conquer everything in their vicinity and move across the majority of the Ancient Eternal Star Region unhindered, looking down on the others.
In the depths of this relatively unknown Temple, an old man with snake-like features was sitting cross-legged as he applied some medicine to his bleeding wounds.
"Dammed Inscests... fortunately, other old coots didn't attack us during this moment of weakness."
He cursed, as in a certain twisted sense of fate, they were indeed lucky, as they were not attacked by other species with Tier 12 backing immediately after the Hivemind departed to another Star Region, which was like heavenly luck smiling at them.
And just as he was tending to his wounds, because the fight with the Hivemind was really terrifying, the old man lived for too long and fought with countless other Tier 12, but when he looked at the Hivemind, he immediately knew that it was the pinnacle of Tier 12, only a small slight step from reaching Tier 13.
He was injured the most from the all Tier 12 powerhouses in the Ancient Eternal Star Region and suffered the most severe injuries.
Suddenly, he opened his eyes, and he saw a disturbing vision in front of his eyes, which was projected in real-time.
He saw thousands if not tens of thousands of voidcrafts heading directly at their Grade 1 Plane, the Serpent Plane, especially when he looked at the biggest vessel, which was in the middle of the swarm of voidships; he saw an immediate threat to his life.
"Chthonians... so they reached this level of Magitek."
Said the old man in resignation when looking at the armada flying toward them; not only that, he also felt an entire bunch of Tier 11 powerhouses and countless Tier 10 and Tier 9 among them; only then did he realize that someone had carefully planned this.